Business Showcase : Pivigo

Pivigo is the go-to hub for data science, AI and machine learning. By connecting organisations with data scientists, Pivigo helps companies harness the value of their data via Europe’s first online Data Science Marketplace and their S2DS data science training program, the largest of its kind in Europe.

How are you different?

Traditionally, if companies wanted to do a data science project they would either have to hire data scientists internally, or employ a consultancy. Both of these options can be very expensive; hiring takes time and is risky if you can’t find the best individual, and consultancies will charge very high day rates. What we are offering is access to some of the smartest analytical talent globally on demand, as a flexible solution. And because we are drawing from a pool of freelancers, we can offer better value than consultancies with all their overheads. This is novel, and we have already had fantastic feed-back from the community, hailing it as a revolution in the data science industry.

We understand data science, and more importantly we understand data scientists. We have been working in this space for four years already; completing over 80 projects with 60 clients and training 320 data scientists. We know what makes a project successful, and we know how to find the brightest person in the room. Because of this, we stand on a very solid foundation to scale this solution online, to a global industry.

Where are you based?
Our headquarters are in Moorgate London, but the marketplace can be accessed across the world and our community of data scientists is global, with circa 20% based in the UK, 65% in the rest of Europe, and 15% internationally.

When was the company launched?
The company was launched in 2013.

What have been your biggest wins to date?

We are very proud of our partnerships and our clients that we have helped over the years. Our biggest win to date is the launch of the marketplace and what 2017 will bring to the Pivigo team, the businesses we work with and the data science community.

What type of people (market segment) are you trying to attract to your product?

Until now we have been very sector (and size) agnostic. From the 60 or so companies and organisations we have worked with, we have large corporates like KPMG, Barclays, Royal Mail, British Gas and M&S, we have SME’s, and of course lots of start-ups such as Ravelin, Benevolent AI, and Network Locum. They are also in many different industries; mainly tech, but also consultancies, healthcare, retail, advertising and non-profits.

Going forward we see a large opportunity in specifically the SME market. A lot of medium to large size organisations collect large amounts of data, without necessarily knowing what value lies in it. Some of our most successful projects to date have been with SME’s, in helping them understand their data and building machine-learning algorithms to, for example, support better pricing or understand risk levels.

Tell us about your team?

The Pivigo team is awesome! I co-founded this business together with Jason Muller, who is now our COO. Jason comes from a recruitment entrepreneur background, and has very solid understanding of process and operations. Our CTO, Ole, is an Astrophysics PhD turned software engineer, which is really great because he understands our core user market (the data scientists) and he is able to guide our product development to their benefit. The rest of the team is a mix of super-smart PhD’s, friendly sales guys and passionate marketeers. Our company ethos has always been to be open, professional and respectful. That goes through everything we do; our relationships with our clients, our interactions with the data science community, and our day-to-day work in the office.

What are you long term plans for your product / company?

Data Science and AI is a global opportunity. I believe we are only at the very beginning of a digital revolution that will transform everything in society; from how we live and work, to how we stay healthy. Companies and organisations are now convinced they need to do more with their data, and are seeking help from external partners. I believe that the option to have data scientists “on demand”, essentially a form of outsourcing, will be very attractive to many organisations, and that is the market we are trying to capture. For now, we are focused on the European market that we know best, but this will be and is a global opportunity. We want to be the go-to partner for data science on demand.

What are your favourite tech gadgets?

For our business, cloud computing is absolutely critical, if that can be considered a gadget? Data sharing, privately and securely, is a huge topic for our clients and today that can typically be done very easily via cloud servers. Privately, I was very happy to get an Amazon Echo unit last year. At this point I am not entirely sure how useful it is, I tend to use it mainly for listening to music and setting alarms, but I think it is the very seed of something that will be ubiquitous everywhere in the future; AI in your home. I dream of a future where my home has a completely integrated AI in it; where I can talk to it and it can integrate all sorts of services such as phone calls, e-mail, calendar, health checks etc. The Echo therefore represents a fascinating future for me.

What tech gadgets do you wish you could use to help you?

In Pivigo, as mentioned previously, better data sharing services would be fantastic. We have a few ideas ourselves of how to support our clients better with that, and may start a project or two soon, but it is a known problem. Wifi/broadband access can also still be a problem for our data scientists, believe it or not. Living in London one easily forgets that internet access can be patchy outside the major cities.
On a personal note, I am also keen to see improvements in smart clothing and fabrics. It is already many years since I first read about clothing that could not only change colours and patterns, but also do so based on, for example, certain health parameters. That sounds like something that could be incredibly useful (think jacket that can change colour based on the air quality level), both from a practical and aesthetic point of view!

How do people get in touch with you?

They can register on the marketplace here www.pivigo.com.
Alternatively they can sign up to our newsletter, follow us on social media or they can email or phone us. [email protected] or 0207 788 4710

If you would like to have your company featured in the Irish Tech News Business Showcase, get in contact with us at [email protected] or on Twitter: @SimonCocking